


the start of all the things that are left to do

by ghostfaeries



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Batfamily (DCU), Batfamily (DCU) Feels, Brotherly Bonding, Canon Compliant, Gen, Gotham City - Freeform, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Late Night Conversations, No Incest, Stars, Talking, Tim Drake is Red Robin, Tim Drake-centric, according to the dictionary tentativity isnt a word, but i like it better than tentativeness so it exists now, if shakespeare could do it so can i, no beta we die like jason todd, thats just what this is. they sit and they talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:41:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25429345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostfaeries/pseuds/ghostfaeries
Summary: “You were my hero, you know.” Tim’s voice rang out clear among the stars and shadows. If it startled Jason, it didn’t show.~Tim and Jason talk
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s), Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Comments: 12
Kudos: 227





	the start of all the things that are left to do

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Wasteland, Baby! by Hozier. It has the right vibes for this, though just the melody and general sound not the romantic undertones of course, cause they're brothers, but yknow
> 
> I don't know what this is. I honestly don't know. I don't think this falls in the fluff or the angst category. It just... exists. Do with that what you will
> 
> Content warnings: there isn't much here I think, only some vague allusions to that time Jason tried to kill Tim after he came back and discovered there was a new Robin. Tell me if I need to add anything
> 
> DISCLAIMER: please do not interact with this fic in any way if you ship Dick, Jason, Cass, Tim, Damian or Duke with each other as this makes me very uncomfortable as someone with siblings, thank you

It was a nice night.

Tim looked out over the city, its twinkling lights making it look softer, gentler. Like a reflection of the blanket of stars above. It was a surprisingly clear night, the clouds not hiding the stars from view for once. The smell of rain hung in the air, the kind of rain you’d find in a forest, fresh and clear and full of life, not in a grimy city like Gotham, muddled and dirty and with traces of ash. But now the skies were clear, no rain cloud in sight, and Tim was sitting on a rooftop. For all Gotham’s faults, the ugliness hiding away in its crevices, the blood in its gutters, the screams lost to the open air, it was still his city, and he would do anything to protect it.

Tonight, he didn’t have to do much protecting. It was unusually quiet, so Batman had sent Red Robin and Robin home for the night and would finish up patrol on his own. Tim had considered going home immediately, but there was nothing waiting for him there, just an empty bed in an empty apartment. It didn’t much feel like a home, anyway.

Instead, he’d elected to watch over the city from one of the largest skyscrapers for a while. He liked to do that, sometimes. To sit on a rooftop and just watch. The stars weren’t visible often, not in Gotham, so he liked to take advantage of it whenever they appeared in the night sky. He liked seeing the lights, it reminded him there was hope, a spark in every night, even the dark that was Gotham.

Tonight felt different, somehow. Maybe it was in the showing of the stars, so rare in this city. Maybe it was in the calm of the night, the lack of disturbance, perhaps even rarer. Although one could argue the absence of crime was a disturbance in of itself.

The rustle of leather sounded behind him, the soft thud of a pair of boots landing on cool stone. Tim didn’t turn around. He knew who it was, had caught the glimpse of familiar red in the glass of the skyscraper across the street. He did not fear the Red Hood.

“’Sup,” Hood said as he dropped down next to him, removing his helmet to reveal the red domino hiding his eyes from the world. Funny, how that was all that protected their identities. Just a small strip of fabric across the face. It wasn’t much, Tim mused. It was just another reminder how fragile this life of theirs was, how easily it could be laid bare and ripped away. Just a small strip of fabric. The armour protecting them from the world. Was it enough?

They were a good foot apart, enough space between them to not be touching, but close enough that they could sense each other’s presence in the air without having to look.

They didn’t talk. They just sat, looking at the city – their city – together.

“You were my hero, you know.” Tim’s voice rang out clear among the stars and shadows. If  it startled Jason, it didn’t show.

Jason side-eyed him. Tim couldn’t tell you how he knew that. Jason’s eyes were still hidden behind the emotionless white of the domino, but somehow, he could tell in the way Jason’s head quirked slightly, the way a strand of hair fell over his forehead with no prompting from the wind. Tim just kept looking at the buildings in front of him, though aware of Jason watching him, trying to find any trace of a lie in Tim’s masked eyes. Tim’s expression betrayed nothing, for there wasn’t anything to betray. There was honesty in the softness of his Kevlar-hidden brow. The quirk of his mouth slightly wistful, but genuine.

Jason finally managed to stutter something out, for all his tentativity. “Me? Not D- Nightwing?”

Tim nodded and leaned back on his hands, tilted his face toward the skies. “Yeah. You.”

They were silent for a while. Tim was in no hurry to elaborate, content to look over the city for now. Jason, his... what even was he? An ally, a friend, a brother. Family. Tim would have shrugged,  were he not resting all of his weight on his hands, rendering it impossible to do so. Jason fell in a strange category of his life. He had never quite been able to place Jason somewhere on the friend/family/ally/enemy scale. He supposed it didn’t matter. Jason was Jason, and right now things were okay between them. That was enough for now.

Jason was sat beside him, equally silent, but pondering unlike Tim. When he spoke, his voice was slightly raspy, as if it had to fight to travel his throat, walk his tongue, leave his mouth. “Why?”

Tim smiled. It wasn’t a happy smile, but neither was it sad. It was just that, a smile. “You were my Robin. I figured it out while N was Robin, yes, but you were  _ my Robin _ . I watched you, you know. You and B. I followed you around at night, just me and my camera. You were so bright. You could make the Batman smile.” Then, softer. “You still can.”

Jason shivered, though from Tim’s words or the cold, Tim did not know. Tim continued.

“I was there for your entire time as Robin. You helped so many people. I thought you were never afraid. I wanted to be like you, when I grew up.” Tim laughed shortly, no humour shining through the sound. “Guess I made that happen, kind of.” He pulled his expression back to its wistful features, soft but knowing. “I never meant to replace you. This was never meant to be permanent. It was just until B was okay again, then I would disappear from this life, go back to being the neighbour kid. Didn’t turn out quite like that, did it.”

It wasn’t a question, though they both knew the answer.

“When you came back... Knowing my childhood hero had tried to kill me was hard, to live with. I lived for you, before, on days. On days it all got to be too much, I thought of you, of your determination, your strength. You never gave up, not until the very end, and I knew I couldn’t either, not until I was done. I’m still here, so it must’ve worked.”

“I’m sorry,” Jason said, abruptly, the first words he’d uttered in minutes. “For-”

“I know,” Tim said, interrupting. “I know. I forgave you a long time ago.”

He remembered the Lazarus induced rage all too well. The cold fury of the green had featured in his nightmares for quite some time.

“Still. Even though I wasn’t... me at the time, I still tried to kill you. I don’t think I ever apologised for that.”

Jason looked at him fully, now. His eyes were still hidden by his mask, but Tim didn’t need to see the swirling clouds of green tinged blue to know what he was feeling.

Tim smiled, and the light of the stars shone through in the glinting of his domino lenses. “Apology accepted.”

They sat in silence beside each other, Red Robin and Red Hood, Tim Drake and Jason Todd. They sat beside each other and they were content, and it was a start.

Yeah. A nice night indeed.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed
> 
> My DC blog: autistic-damian-wayne


End file.
